Been Away for months...

[Barkhorn1x]

...hey guys - been away for awhile - and it looks like I missed a lot of stuff.

Can someone briefly fill me in on the following:
1. The 1.2 Patch = does it really blow?
2. The "sabotage" thing = what was that all about?
3. The XP pack = what is it - doesn't seem to be listed at the CA site - just that Spartan console thing - unless (dear god no!) that IS the XP pack!
4. Anything else I missed.

Thanks,
Barkhorn.

[Tricky Lady]

Welcome back!

A quick answer to your questions:

1) yes. Good things replaced bad things and some bad things (reload feature :cough:bug:cough:) were added.
2) dunno
3) there are rumours (just rumours) about a Barbarian Invasion XP being released later this year.

[mfberg]

1. Not really

2. Which sabatoge thing?

3. Expansion Pack is mentioned in the Barbarian Invasion threads, we hope it will make the answer to #1 better.

4. The world ended, but you had to be there.

mfberg

[Colovion]

the 1.2 patch is good, but it also adds new bugs and doesn't fix some old ones. However, it is the best that they've released yet, so we begrudgingly accept it.

the sabatoge thing was a bunch of people that were upset about the lack of customer support - the Com was having complaint threads closed/people banned - so people took it 'to the streets', as it were. Instead of complaining to the source, which wasn't working, they decided to warn respective buyers of the folly in their ways.

[Red Harvest]

The 1.2 patch fixes quite a few bugs and it is the best we have. Unfortunately, it introduces several problems as well. And a number of other issues with the strategic game have surfaced: namely that there is a gigantic problem with the AI in general "resetting" after loading a save. This is one of the reasons that the game is stronger early on than it is late in a campaign.

At this point I consider the strategic game broken and associated combat boring. It was that way with 1.0/1.1, but we had hope back then.

CA has muffed the customer support side of RTW. When they capped their official forum a bit too tightly and failed to address the concerns well enough, they angered quite a few folks, the pressure had to go somewhere. As a result, a grassroots campaign started to point out the lack of support and the current state of the game to industry reviewers, and in customer reviews on Amazon, etc. I've steered clear of involvement in most of that, although I certainly sympathize with the others. My lone contribution has been to give the game a 1 star rating on Amazon. I don't play it anymore, and can't recommend it. I was going to give it a 3, but some of the 5 star ratings irritated me enough to decide "weighting" was in order.

[player1]

Actually, only thing "broken" by 1.2 is battle difficulty level (battles are easier since AI attack bonus is gives to human players too, leading to faster instead of harder battles).

As for loadgame bug, it was there all time, from 1.0. It's just that it wasn't discovered until recently.

[Red Harvest]

The horse/elephant/chariot archer bug was introduced by 1.2 as well. Most of that can be fixed, although the elephant part remains broken. Fortunately, the effect is small for elephants. And 1.2 also changed the problems with the trait bugs: hello, scarface. A couple of other small new things also appeared with units and recruitment, because of things that didn't work prior to 1.2 that now work, but weren't thought through by CA.

[player1]

Yes, fortunately those others can be fixed by editing text files...

[Epistolary Richard]

4. Anything else I missed.

Nah, it's been pretty quiet...

[Barkhorn1x]

Hey thanks guys. So should I even load 1.2 then?? I really don't like the sound of FASTER battles - they are plenty fast already.

...and yea, it sounds like CA did let the grogs down after all. And now they are owned by Sega - which is NOT a good sign for the TW franchise no matter how some want to spin it that way.

Sigh..."there was a time in the early part of this century son when a game company called CA came out with a ground breaking sim called Shogun Total War. Those were the days...sniff".

Barkhorn.

[Red Harvest]

I would still recommend downloading the 1.2 patch. The horse archer problem is fixable. The friendly fire improvements are definitely worthwhile, and troops marching now get credit for their shields when under missile fire. There is also the pri/sec bug repair. This was found in the nick of time by a modder, and delayed the patch slightly. The pri/sec bug was resulting in all missile units getting credit for their primary (missile) attack in melee, when they should have been using secondary. Chief beneficiary for the bug was Rome...with all pila units effectively getting +4 attack prior to 1.2 if memory serves. Other beneficiaries were skirmishers and archers. On the strategic map the insanely large navies are gone, the AI will blockade. The AI will now do more with its armies in a turn like chasing down rebel armies that formerly escaped repeatedly. Skirmishers work much better than before, although still have some issues related to the narrow difference between effective range, and flee range.

The biggest new negative is the difficulty level change. Both the human and AI now get the same attack bonus (+4 for hard, and +7 for very hard as best we can tell.) The AI also seems to get a morale bonus that the human doesn't. Kill rate was already a problem, but it is FUBAR on VH now. So VH is rather unfun. Hard or medium would be better choices. In effect instead of difficulty levels, they are combat speed levels now.

[Benny Moore]

Don't forget the shoreline squares! Those were not in the game prior to one point two.

[Barkhorn1x]

OK then - looks like I'm going to get it.

Thanks,
Barkhorn.

[Craterus]

4. You missed my rise to power!! Check out my posts per day!! Hehe lol..

[Arrowhead]

4.You missed my crushing of all my enemies!(Especially Emperor Umeu 1)

I don't care about anything, I just passed my Grade one guitar music exam with honours and my hero Tom Boonen just won the Flanders and Roubaix cycling races double. Not even RTW bugs can spoil that.

[The Stranger]

oh arrow through your head you're a dead man. and the sabotage thing probably is my boycot action, wich ARROWHEAD sabotaged.

btw ARROWHEAD do you have any shooters like MOHPA or Call of Duty. so i can sniper your head off.

[Arrowhead]

oh arrow through your head you're a dead man. and the sabotage thing probably is my boycot action, wich ARROWHEAD sabotaged.

btw ARROWHEAD do you have any shooters like MOHPA or Call of Duty. so i can sniper your head off.

I like sabotaging things.